Everyone loves Canadians; it's Canada they hate

Everyone loves Canadians; it's Canada they hate

After 6-minute press conference: no wonder

Canada has, in certain circles, been getting a lot of respect hereabouts. UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer was quoted this week praising Canada for working “very constructively” during the talks and a Danish negotiator (to remain nameless) was positively fullsome on the level of ambition and quality of the contribution that individual Canadians have been making to the process.

Yet Canada is consistently derided by Environmental NGO’s monitoring the talks and it is a clear leader in the Fossil of the Day awards given to the country most guilty of obstructing the likelihood of a fair, ambitious and binding agreement.

A hint as to the reason for this apparent contradiction arrived today in the form of Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice. In a late-in-the-day press briefing COP 15 President Connie Hedegaard celebrated the early arrival of ministers from around the world, saying that, as the ministers arrive, so does the good will. Prentice may mark the exception.In a first press briefing of his own, he took three questions over an elapsed time period that might actually have been slightly more than six minutes. He reiterated the claim that Canada was working “in a constructive way.” He said the new texts that had been produced in the last few days offered “a useful basis to move forward.” And he said (in more, and slightly less specific words) that he had no intention of discussing exemptions for Northern Canadians now, or outside Canada. Then he left.

Canada’s position is problematic. All the world, save the United States, wants to renew and reinforce the Kyoto Protocol. Canada, which has blown disastrously past its Kyoto commitment level, is desperate to abandon it. Push will come to shove in the next six days and Canadians - whose reputation is currently being improved by a legion of professionial negotiators - could soon be personified by its Environment Minister and by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. If today’s demonstration is an example of what is to come, that won’t be pretty.

Previous Comments

Yes, as I Canadian, this is very embarrassing. We seem to be doing all we can to wreck Copenhagen. Several of our provincial premiers have attended because they are so disgusted at Ottawa and might negotiate independant agreements. I can only hope this puts pressure on the federal government to do something. http://www.selfdestructivebastards.com/2009/12/bad-canada.html

Well, they shouldn’t have to worry about revenue. If they lose the tar sands revenue and require some transfer payments, as an Ontarian, I’m fine with that. They should get as much money from the federal government as any other province would in similar circumstances.

No one wants Albertans to starve or anything, but the tar sands have to go.

There is no reasons for the tar sands to go as they are only 5-10% more CO2 emitting then conventional oil. Especially considering how Canadians have pitched in billions bailing out the automakers in Ontario so that Ontario can continue building gas guzzling Camaros and the like.

Paul, the tar sands release several times more emissions, at least. They require tons of energy to process the tar, and tons of water is used as well. This also produces a lot of pollution that is poisoning some native populations. It’s not just a few percent. That doesn’t even include all the deforestation, which is, of course, removing a natural carbon sink. I would agree, though, once the tar sands are gone, we should conserve and reduce our consumption of conventional oil as well.

I completely agree with your comment about bailing out the autoworkers, we should not have done it, and shouldn’t do it again. However, there’s a way we can help the autoworkers and the environment at the same time. Build more rail (especially electrified rail), retrain the autoworkers to build train cars, and reuse idle factories for this purpose. This can create a lot of jobs, and get passengers and cargo onto trains instead of cars and trucks, which is several times more efficient.

Rhetoric notwithstanding, no, the tar sands are not terribly polluting. Only 5-10% more emissions then from the production of regular crude. As for the “poisoning” of native populations, medical experts have debunked that spurious claim.

Considering all provinces are increasing their CO2 emissions year after year, it is hypocritical to ask only one to suffer.

The tar sands, by themselves, produce more emissions than the total emissions of 145 *countries*. Your claim about 5 or 10 percent is nonsensical, this is orders of magnitude larger than conventional oil.

Again, I don’t want to see Alberta suffer, I’m perfectly happy for them to receive federal equalization payments, just like every other province. We don’t let poorer provinces suffer in this country (at least we’re not supposed to.) We’re one country, and everyone should get an equal share. It’s just happenstance that resources happen to be in one place rather than another, and the benefit (or cost) should be accrued to all Canadians.

Right or Wrong, shutting down the tarsands doesn’t look like it’s a near term thing. We are gearing up for expansion, building a pipeline and providing the most energy dependent nation in the world a source of energy that they will not be able to replace.

Instead of shutting down the project, which would be very difficult, reduce demand. Let the world tell Alberta “No thanks we don’t need your oil” Let the Americans and the world significantly reduce their use of petroleum voluntarily.

Market demand really is the only thing you need to reduce emissions. If people are serious they will stop looking for draconian government intervention in our lives and stop polluting at home. That is the funny thing about AGW, it has no financial currency to it. Oil sands production is ramping up to meet demand. Oil, coal and natural gas futures contract all have positive values indicating rising future demand, Insurance companies are still issuing 40 year mortgage insurance to coastal cities, the carbon credit market in chicago sells carbon credits for less than 10 cents.

Everyone that is anyone knows the AGW theory is smoke and mirrors comprised of junk science. It’s just a question of wether the politics of AGW will push it past the finish line. Right now it looks like the real money is lined up behind the theory dying off.

There is no poisoning of natives. That story is bunk and perpetrated by eco-extremists and agitators. No credible medical experts support the fairy tale. The doctor who made the bogus claims was reprimanded because his conduct was so unprofessional.

“…Health Canada officials now claim that O´Connor grossly exaggerated the truth about “cancer and other diseases in Fort Chipewyan.” In particular they allege that Dr. O´Connor told the media that he found as many as six possible cases of cholangiocarcinoma, (a nasty rare bile duct cancer) when in fact a 2009 Alberta Cancer Study reported only two cases.

This charge is false…

….Of six suspected cases identified by Dr. O´Connor, the Alberta Cancer Board confirmed two cases of cholangiocarinoma; three that were closely related biliary duct cancers; and one that was not cancer. Two of the biliary duct cancers (bile duct adenocarinoma and adenocarcinoma of Ampulla of Vater) are often recognized as cholangiocarinoma by medical authorities. In total the Board confirmed that five out of six bile duct cancers were indeed bile duct cancers…” http://straightouttaedmonton.blogspot.com/2009/12/andrew-nikiforuk-open-letter-to.html

It should be obvious to all that the fraud at CRU puts the entire AGW theory into the toilet. It will take years to reconstruct a valid temperature record, if ever.

Copenhagen is a giant UN/EU socialist dream to skim off $$$ and enrich themselves. It is a modern version of the rights of clergy and nobility to extract sums from the peasants.

Obama is at least going to require the $$$ to go through the world bank, ie, business as usual, with accountability and no UN fat cats in the middle.

John Travolta will get into his private Boeing 707 and head off to wherever, secure in his feeling that he has “done something” for the downtrodden. yah, right.. but at least it is his own money, and not cherity money that could otherwise go to provide water supplies in Africa.

The long string of bold numbers in the second set of brackets is the “fudge factor” applied (supposedly) to the raw data [iii]. This string of numbers “adjusts” the raw data from 1904 to 1994 in five-year increments. Here is what these nineteen numbers roughly look like on a simple graph (each bar below represents a number in bold above):

I have left a space between the bars that represent each number so the reader can compare the temperature line to the numbers from the program. Time is once again indicated by the x-axis (horizontal). Temperature is portrayed on the y-axis (vertical).

The numbers in the code indicate a degree of cheating that is actually much larger than I was able to show with the bars in Graph 3 [iv].

We can now prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the hockey stick is an absolute ruse. The hockey stick graph cannot possibly be based on the actual data. (…Wherever and whatever that data might have been, that is. The CRU has admitted destroying the raw data.)

Now other arguments about fraud have been shown to be based on often deliberate neglect of the context of ‘suspect’ statements, the denialist bloggers have withdrawn to the computercode, speculating that most of us know too little about computer language to really perceive what is going on. Of course most of the time these bloggers haven’t got a clue as to what is really said there (I suspect that Ed_B is among them) but it is enough for them if their source puts up a lot of computer hocus pocus and then concludes to fraud.

Well, here is a rebuttal by Tim Lambert at Deltoid of a similar attempt to use the computercode in this fashion by a certain Raymond. Lambert is of course a computer scientist. It is a longish piece but it is worth quoting:

“David Kane asks me to look at two of the strongest arguments made by the “other side” following the break in and theft of data from CRU. OK, once he sees how weak the strongest arguments are, we can all agree that the affair is a beat up.

Raymond says: “This, people, is blatant data-cooking, with no pretense otherwise. It flattens a period of warm temperatures in the 1930s – see those negative coefficients? Then, later on, it applies a positive multiplier so you get a nice dramatic hockey stick at the end of the century.”

But what is the code directly following the fragment Raymond quotes? Look:

;
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
;IDL uses a semi-colon to indicate a comment, so the only code to use yearlyadj has been commented out. Raymond must have known this since he is an Emacs user and Emacs colour codes the comments. This doesn’t seem to be a smoking gun so much as a gun that hasn’t been fired.

Furthermore, another piece of commented out code shows how the adjusted values were used: they were clearly labelled as “MXD corrected” and plotted along with the uncorrected values. They were not shown as temperature values despite what Raymond says.

As other have repeatedly pointed out, that code was written to be used for some kind of presentation that was false. The fact that the deceptive parts are commented out now does not change that at all.

In fact, it was labelled as “corrected for decline”, so it was not false or deceptive.

Raymond continues:

“It might get them off the hook if we knew – for certain – that it had never been shown to anyone who didn’t know beforehand how the data was cooked and why. But since these people have conveniently lost or destroyed primary datasets and evaded FOIA requests, they don’t deserve the benefit of that doubt. We already know there’s a pattern of evasion and probable cause for criminal conspiracy charges from their own words.”

In fact, they did not destroy primary datasets, and they did not have permission to redistribute the data requested using the FOIA.

Raymond has made no attempt to find out if the graph was actually used anywhere. The file name was osborn-tree6/briffa_sep98_d.pro, so we should look for a paper with authors, Briffa and Osborn published in 1998 and sure enough there’s Briffa, Schweingruber, Jones, Osborn, Harris, Shiyatov, Vaganov and Grudd “Trees tell of past climates: but are they speaking less clearly today?” Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B 1998:

They say:

In §4, we referred to a notable correspondence between ‘hemispheric’ MXD series (averaged over all sites) and an equivalent ‘hemispheric’ instrumental temperature series. Despite their having 50% common variance measured over the last century, it is apparent that in recent decades the MXD series shows a decline, whereas we know that summer temperatures over the same area increased. Closer examination reveals that while year-to-year (i.e. mutually ten-year high-pass filtered) correlations are consistently high between tree-growth and temperature (ca. 0.7 for 1881-1981), the correlations based on decadally smoothed data fall from 0.89, when calculated over the period 1881-1960, to 0.64 when the comparison period is extended to 1881-1981. This is illustrated in figure 6, which shows that decadal trends in both large-scale- average TRW and MXD increasingly diverge from the course of decadal temperature variation after about 1950 or 1960.

And figure 6 is basically the graph plotted by the code above and it does not include the “corrected MXD” data:

Part of the fraud concocted by the Swifthackers is that they, often deliberately, interpreted terms that, within context, were quite innocuous, in the most unfavorable manner possible (“trick” “hide the decline” etc.) Apparently the same game is being played now with the term “fudge factor”. I understand that it is a neutral technical term in computerese that is now being used as “evidence” of deliberate fraud. Here is one post by a commenter called Dhogaza that provides some background:

“People trying to understand data tweak its processing all of the time. It’s perfectly normal behavior when you’re asking “what if?” scenarios. Someone proposes a corrective factor, presumably based on some plausible snippet of knowledge, applies it to the data to see how that changes things, etc.

I’ve been involved for years with monitoring raptor migration at various sights in the semi-arid western United States. Some people were using our hourly reports to try to figure out how local geography affected the daily pattern of migration at two sites about 200 or 300 miles apart, east-west (migrating hawks roost at night, how far north from a site they roost impacts how early in the day they start showing up at a given site).

They couldn’t get the times to jive with the distances, so finally I asked, “did you correct the times for the site positions within the timezone?”. Local sun time was something like 30 or 45 minutes different.

Now, I’m not sure what the little program they wrote looked like for certain, but if Eric Raymond were to see a line saying “fudge site A times by 30 minutes” I’m sure he’d scream “FRAUD! FRAUD! FRAUD!”.

I don’t doubt it for a moment.

These people aren’t interested in investigating why a researcher might be trying out various ideas on the data, in their minds, if they have a program showing adjustments then ITISALL A COMMIEPLOT!

“Fudge factors are invented variables whose purpose is to force a calculated result to give a better match to what happens in the real world.

Fudge factors are usually calculated retrospectively, and when a calculation has only managed to produce a good match to real data by the addition of a variable that seems artificially tailored to allow that result (to allow the calculations to be “fudged” to give the right answer), critics may sometimes refer to the variable in an uncomplimentary way as a “fudge factor”.” (Wikipedia)

So to give a better match to the data about the REALWORLD, Ed_B - not the imagined world deniers want to pass off on us.

I had one year of calculus and one year of physics in college… and remember that math/science types use ‘trick’ to describe a method of solving a problem or a proof. In fact, they used it all the time and were especially proud to use it when their method was more elegant or simple than the standard method.

Climate change deniers operate at a level of intellectual discourse where anything that takes more than 10 seconds to understand is dismissed out of hand.

well there is that thing about intellectual discourse being limited to 10 second explanations. I guess that could be laziness or perhaps attention deficit. I believe that in his heart of hearts, he is saying that he is reasonably smart and by contrast, those on the opposite side are missing that mark. They are dumb. That continues to be my interpretation.

I can understand being caught up in the religious ferver of the global warming movement but why not throw the shady characters under the bus and move on? It’s quite clear to everyone now that Jones and Mann will not be practising scientists. They didn’t step down becuase they are innocent. This is a nice gradual method to eliminate them.

The evidence is extremely daming and puts a lot of research into question. Mccyntire had a great expose yesterday on his blog, combined with the spghetti computer code these guys are toast.

No temperature records, no peer review process, no credibility, no warming. The theory will be dragged down with these guys.

Yes the guy running up to the bank teller with a loaded 45 is just there to show off his new pistol. No he’s not there to rob the place he’s just proud of his new firearm. LOL

The computer code is one of the many smoking guns here, all the talking AGW heads avoid this topic like the plague. Is it plausible that the computer code that artificially increases temperature data is labeled fudge factor is simply a mechanism to test the computer program? Yes but it is about as likely as my previous anology of the guy running into the bank with a 45.

All computer code batches used for testing are labeled fudge factor instead of something like TEST. The accompanying programmer notes explaining how the programming will artificially increase temperature data are just there too fool deniers.
Jones and Mann are eerily silent about the code, I guess they are just too busy planning their new careers right now.
The entire PR machine of AGW just figured it was best left to the Arie brands to fight this one and don’t say a word about it.
All the e-mails put the computer code in perfect context of scientists not acting not like scientists but activists is just a coincidence I suppose.
The debunked hockey stick graph was just a coincidence too?
Where is the computer programmer to coroborate Aries story?
Why is the CRU trying to pressure scientists into signing a petition instead of giving explanations?
Did Mann and Jones just step down because they needed a break? How often do you see people that step down get their old job back? How about Never.

In life elaborate confusing stories are jsut like they seem elaborate and the intent is to confuse the facts. The most likely explanation is usually the correct one. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that something is rotten in the state of denmark!
(Wow, what a great denoument!)

Now you brazenly lie even when there is evidence to the contrary in the same thread.

“The computer code is one of the many smoking guns here, all the talking AGW heads avoid this topic like the plague.”

Tim Lamberts demolition of Raymond was reproduced above. His post attracted 336 comments, the great majority being from the “talking AGW heads”. You better have a look there and to quote a famous Australian PM’s admonition to the opposition: “Shut up and listen, you might learn something.” http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2009/12/quote_mining_code.php

The very idea that Harper can blatantly promote tar sands oil to the Chinese and then claim to be working “constructively” to stop climate change with his pitiful targets is a humiliation and an international disgrace. I want an “I didn’t vote for this government” T-shirt!

The obvious conclusion…tyranical, greedy and cruel governments in third world countries have, for decades, oppressed their populations and stolen the land’s wealth….now of course, because the developed world has prospered….has heat and electricity we have to compensate them.
Perfectly sensible in Copenhagen I suppose.

Democracy is utterly dependent upon an electorate that is accurately informed. In promoting climate change denial (and often denying their responsibility for doing so) industry has done more than endanger the environment. It has undermined democracy.

There is a vast difference between putting forth a point of view, honestly held, and intentionally sowing the seeds of confusion. Free speech does not include the right to deceive. Deception is not a point of view. And the right to disagree does not include a right to intentionally subvert the public awareness.